Motion Sensor Battery Didn’t Last Long

The main properties that affect battery life are ‘Occupancy Hold Time’, ‘Report Time’, and the ‘Force Transmit’ properties.

‘Occupancy Hold Time’ is the first property you should adjust to increase battery life. It defaults to a low value so it’s easy to test during installation. Once motion detection has been reported, no more motion detects will be reported until motion end has been reported. Motion end will not be reported until there has been no motion for the amount of time listed in ‘Occupancy Hold Time’. Setting ‘Occupancy Hold Time’ to the highest value that will work for your application should increase battery life by having less reports for motion detects and ends.

To maximize battery life, you should minimize the amount of reports from this device. Each report requires wireless communication which uses much more power than any other function of this device. This device will give a variety of reports including mandatory scheduled reports. The property ‘Report Time’ refers to how often the scheduled reports will occur. Set this to the maximum value to conserve batteries. The scheduled report contains data from all the sensors. Changes measured by the sensors can also trigger these reports. If a sensor’s value changes by more than it’s related ‘Force Transmit’ property in between scheduled reports, it will trigger a report. ‘Force Transmit’ properties are defaulted to ‘Off’ to maximize battery life.